A typical computer system is comprised of a control system (e.g., microprocessor or microcontroller) and one or more components. The components are connected with the control system to allow the transfer of information (e.g., instructions and/or data) therebetween. In the implementation of some computer systems, each component is directly wired to the control system. Accordingly, a separate wired connection is provided for each component. This allows the control system to independently communicate with each component. However, separate wiring of each component to the control system can be complex, time consuming, and error prone.
In order to simplify the wiring, the control system and all the associated components are connected to a common bus (also referred to as a “shared bus”). When a common bus is used, each component must have an assigned address, so that each component can recognize which instructions from the control system are intended for that component. In other words, since all of the information communicated between the control system and the components travels through the common bus, each of the components must be able to distinguish which information is intended for that component.
In the implementation of some computer systems, jumpers and dip switches on each component are used to establish an address in a hardware setting for that component. For example, the jumpers or dip switches on a first component may be set to address 0001 to establish a first address, while the jumpers or dip switches on a second component may be set to address 0010, to establish a second address. However, if there are many components in the computer system, it can be time consuming to set jumpers or dip switch settings for each component. Also, an error in setting the jumpers or dip switches will result in malfunctioning of the computer system.
Surgical lighting systems used in a surgical suite are typically comprised of a computer system that includes a main computer control unit and one or more lightheads, wherein each lighthead has a plurality of light modules. Each light module may include a control unit, one or more LED strings, and one or more sensors (e.g., light sensors, distance sensors, and the like). In order to simplify the manufacturing process, the main computer control unit and the plurality of light modules may be connected to a common bus, as described above. For proper communication between the main computer control system and the light modules, each light module must have an assigned address for identifying a specific light module on the common bus. As indicated above, there are some significant drawbacks to using jumpers and/or dip switches to assign an assigned address to each component in hardware.
The present invention provides an address assignment system and method that overcomes these and other drawbacks of the prior art.